8th March 2012

So on the 5th of March Daisy's quarantine was finished. Although she has been sick so won't be introducing her to Kirby and Charlie yet.

She went on a course of antibiotics and I'm really not sure if it has helped but she isn't getting worse that I can tell.

As for taming, its gone way downhill due to having to grab her out of the cage twice a day and put a syringe in her mouth with yucky tasting medicine in it, so now she doesn't like my hands anywhere near her cage.

She has more toys now, but doesn't go near them. Mostly she sits in the same place all day and I'm not sure if this is because she is sick and has no energy or she just doesn't know what the use of toys is. I think she may be a little sad that she is by herself, but I can't introduce her to Kirby and Charlie until I'm sure she is okay and she is more tame.

she's moulting and has grown a tail feather which I'm really pleased about, so her balance is getting better.

I put veggies in her cage for the first time today, so far she hasn't touched them also put vitamin supplement in her water now she is off her antibiotics in case she does have vitamin deficiencies because her feathers still look rough and messy. 

Kirby and Charlie are doing great eating veggies and being good little birdies :)

budgie update

Daisy

Daisy is on day 11 on Quarantine, I feel like she has been here longer than that.

She is showing no signs of illness and is preening and looking after herself well.

I can get her to eat millet from my hand and I'm working with her to step up onto a perch while she is in the cage which she does sometimes when she is feeling confident.

she is still quite afraid though, and I think she may be scared of the clicker :/

otherwise she is doing great settling in playing with her toys more now- especially her mirror toy with the bells on it. She only falls of the perch every now and then if she gets a fright, but doesn't seem to hurt herself and just climbs back up to her perch.

I'm hoping that her training will keep going good and things will start to improve with her getting used to my hands!

Kirby and Charlie

Target training (using clicker training) is going great for Kirby & Charlie, they are both very smart at touching the target and getting their treat and try to race each other to get to the target stick first.

I want to move on and start training them outside of the cage, possibly targeting them to a perch and then eventually getting them to target to me- fly to me :)

But this will probably take some time, since their attention span isn't very high :P and if they aren't in the mood to learn I just imagine them flying all over the room paying no attention to me! haha but I can try! lol

DAISY DAY 7

Yesterday Daisy got a new cage :)
Its not the best cage for a Budgie, but much bigger than the one she was in...
Its quite high, and I was a little worried she would hurt herself if she fell of a perch.. so I layed newspaper in the bottom for softer landing. But she has become really good at climbing and seems much happier :)
I think she knows now she is safe, she preens herself lots and talks to Kirby and Charlie, she also will eat Millet from my hand now whenever I offer it to her, and doesn't get afraid when I open the cage door.
She is also learning a little to play with her toys! 


Every day I'm looking to see if she has pin feathers hoping her tail feathers will grow back, but I'm preparing myself in case they don't and I'm sure now she will get more confident and live a happy life here even if she can't fly.




here is a pic of Daisy in her new cage :) 

its such a mansion compared to what she used to be in. and the top opens up to turn into a play gym above the cage, so when her quarantine is done and she is a little more tame I will try letting her out and see if she likes sitting up there :)

Since my last post earlier this morning, Daisy has improved :)

I took her to the living room with me while watching tv and she chirped a few times! 

then back to the bedroom, I've spent like my entire day in here apart from when I was cleaning the bird trays and when I was eating :P

Finally she got the courage to move from her perch and eat really quickly, then again she went down to her food this time for longer..

Then a little while after she started preening!! while I was sitting right here, and she managed to get the poo that was stuck to her bum off so now I have more confidence that she is able to do that herself I won't have to get her out and scare the poor baby.

She'll have most of tomorrow to get more used to her cage and then I'll be home from work and will try putting my hand in again.

She really hasn't used her wings at all, maybe she is just choosing not to, she goes to the edge of her perch and then climbs down the wire to get to her food!

anyway she's been eating away like she suddenly realised it was safe to eat!!

I took some pics of her and she just looked at me like "you're taking pictures again while I'm eating this time!?!?!" she will have to learn mummy likes to take lots of pictures of her budgies and spoil them too :)

Daisy

Today is the third day Daisy has been here...
she's not showing signs of being very comfortable, and doesn't move around the cage much.
When I had Charlie this is when I started the millet training, and Charlie started progressing immediately.


But Daisy is a very scared budgie, she has no confidence and hasn't even been exploring her cage much she just sits on the perch.


I had to get her out again today because she had poo on her bottom again.. that's a bad sign and I don't know why it would be happening.. Maybe stress and she isn't preening herself properly.


On a closer look she is also missing several flight feathers from one of her wings... This pretty much tells me its not French moult or cause by a moult because when budgies moult they lose the same amount of feathers on each wing.
So I'm now thinking she has either been frightened by a cat or dog, or handled really badly. Budgie's will lose feathers if being chased by a dog or cat under stress and to try and confused the cat/dog.


Anyway I will keep trying to make her feel safe and trust me, but its a little hard when I keep having to grab her and take her out of the cage to clean her up.


I will most likely be taking her to the vet if things don't improve within a week or so in case she has some other problem. But I'm thinking its just stress.
I think it would really calm her to be able to go near Kirby and Charlie but I just can't risk that at the moment.

Meet the newest addition to the flock

This little girl got brought back to the pet store by her owners because she "couldn't fly"...

She isn't missing any flight feathers but has no tail feathers causing her to have bad balance. I don't know if she has always been like this or if they will grow back but I think they must have had her in a small cage and not actually let her out to see if she could fly.

She doesn't have a name yet, and has just started quarantine. She's pretty calm and I'm letting her settle in and will start the taming/bonding process.

I want her to get really tame, as she won't be put in the same cage as Kirby and Charlie. They will all play together outside of the cage, but I wouldn't trust Kirby to be nice.

So I'm going to hopefully get her tame and she will come and play with me lots.. & hopefully get along with my two when they are out together.

so day one of quarantine begins!

training with charlie

Today I went to a pet store to buy a new water dish as the other one cracked somehow.. I also got a rope perch (because they were on sale for only $7!!).


I was going to let the birds out today, but there ended up being no time..
I did however manage to separate them in different sides of there cage so I could talk to charlie a little.
I'm taking things slowly, he stood on my finger and its longer now that he stands without biting. I also played some videos of other budgies talking and he actually paid a fair bit of attention but kirby was chirping and got quite distracting.
So I'm going to try repeating simple things right now, probably just like "hello" or "hello birdies" and "pretty bird" that kind of thing.
His really getting good and making different noises... and seems to love chirping and bobbing his head away :)


I've been doing a lot of research about training parrots and birds in general, and am really liking what I'm learning.
I felt with Charlie and Kirby when I first got them progress was slow, and then it suddenly went fast and they were jumping on my hands and kirby especially was SO confident... but then I was so excited about the progress the training kind of stopped... I was at a dead end "what should I do next?"


I felt I didn't know how to take the next step, they're both quickly becoming confident birds while they are in the cage, and even while out of the cage... but how do I make them LEARN, how do I make them pay attention. To really want to be out of the cage.. a lot of the time when they come out they just run around on the top of the cage together.
I would love to teach them to fly to me when called and get them flying, really exercising those wings...
Last time they were out they ran around on the carpet which is fine, but I would like them to fly more :)


So I think my plan is:
1. be consistent, make sure they have training sessions out of the cage at least once a week. (so they get used to coming out and viewing it as a good thing)
2. do target training every day with charlie and kirby both.
3. talk to them more, repeating the same phases... (to do this I'm going to try and say hello every time i come in the room and goodbye when I leave)
4. spend more time just with Charlie on my hand so there is no jealousy from Kirby. then after playing with Charlie make sure to play with Kirby so she understands she gets her turn too.


hopefully I make some progress and the birds will soon be flying every week and learning new things :)

skylah, Joey and Banana PICTURES

Here are the pictures my friend sent to me of skylah joey and banana in the aviary. They look like they are so happy :)
Skylah's eye is slowly growing back feathers so hopefully within a few months she will be all better.


here is skylah and joey hanging out together (they are still a cute couple)

Skylah, Joey and Banana all together :)

        Joey hanging out with his English budgie friend 

Joey being handsome

I'm so glad that they are feeling better & enjoying life in the aviary :)

skylah, Joey and Banana UPDATE

I realised I never updated about them. They spent about a month with me, they got treated every day with baby oil once the scaly face started to clear up a bit because the actual scaly face treatment was very harsh, the were also treated with ivomec twice (spot on treatment for mites).
They then went to live at my friends Mum. She has a huge aviary, and also two big bird cages. (all filled with budgies).
Skylah, joey and Banana got kept there still in quarantine for a few weeks. They got treated twice more with ivomec just to be safe, and the mites cleared up.

Joey's beak had really started to get better whilst staying with me, I gave him a toy used to help keep the beak trimmed and he was happy to chew on it. And soon enough the long part on his beak wore down.

I've heard from there new owner skylahs beak has also improved and she is starting to grow back feathers around her eye.
They have all been moved into the new aviary and are getting along great with the other birds. AND they are eating fruit and veg!
They have come such a long way after being 3 very sick budgies with severe mites and vitamin deficiencies to healthy and happy budgies :)

pics will be up latter!

Once again its been a long time since I update :( Sorry!


Anyway Kirby and Charlie are doing good as usual. Kirby has become more and more bossy but Charlie loves her anyway!
There was thought on moving them outside. Reasons being were:
a) They would have a big cage to fly
b) fresh air
c) I could add to the flock..


but the reasons I didn't want them to:
a) I was afraid it would be too hard to play with them
b) kirby would be sad because she loves human interaction
c) scared they wouldn't survive outside.


So it ended up being decided they weren't going outside! Because it was too expensive and I couldn't imagine not having them with me, I'd miss their noisy chatter!


I am still planning one day when I move out for their cage to be upgraded to a nice big flight cage, but this won't be until I live out of home & can keep it inside.


Right now they seem so happy in their long cage. I rearranged it the other day, added some old toys and swings they hadn't seen for a while.. Charlie seems to get attached to things that used to be Kirby's and are pink/girl colours :P
I rearranged it one morning and that night/VERY early morning they had several night frights! Sometimes they will have on night fright, usually a little after I've turned the light out.. but every time I turned the light on... waited for them to calm down, turned the light back off and 10 minutes latter it was happening again!
I was so glad I was home & could turn the light on so they didn't hurt themselves. 
they  haven't had one since though thankfully.


I'm also planning on spending some more time taming Charlie alone. Reason is, lately I haven't had enough time to spend with them, once they both became tame I stopped doing little taming lessons and now I just stick my hand in the cage to play.. But Kirby gets all the attention and when Charlie tries to join in he gets chased away.. (naught kirby).
But I think Charlie has more potential to become even more tame and confident... I also think he has potential to learn to talk. he listens intently when I speak to him :)

budgie progress

visited the vets to get some advice on the budgies.
To make them better I am:
-giving fresh water twice a day with added multi vitamin suplement.
-putting scaly face mite treatment on their beaks/ceres.
-putting baby oil on their feet to smother any mites. (I'm not using the mite treatment on their feet because they get it in their mouths and that isn't good for them) also putting some baby oil around skylahs eye in case there are mites there.
-taking them out to be in the sun for at least 20 minutes each day & spraying them with water to help their feathers.
-giving fresh fruit every day (but so far they haven't tried eating it)




Bananas(yellow budgie) scaly face is starting to look a bit better.
Joey (male yellow face/green) doesn't seem to have noticeable mites on his feet or face so just adding a bit of baby oil as a precaution. But he still has a deformed beak which will hopefully get better with good nutrition.
Skylah: has an overgrown beak, and bad scaly face mites all over her beak/cere. but when that clears up she can get her beak trimmed, and hopefully will grow feathers back around her eye.


enjoying the sunshine

poor skylahs eye!

new rescue budgies

There have been 3 budgies at work for a while out the back because they have scaly face mites, and are not very well.
Today my boss asked if I wanted to take them home as they just aren't recovering there. So its my new mission to get them healthy :)


theres two girls and a boy, one of the girls is an english budgie and I'm considering keeping her because I think she is just gorgeous!


the other two have scaly face quite worse, and also vitamin d deficience, who knows what else is wrong with them :(


so will be going to the store tomorrow to get: cuttle bone, mineral block and iodine block.
will also be trying to get them to eat some veggies & getting some sunshine (vitamin d) and hopefully they will be better soon.


Once they are all better (could take a month or longer) they are going to live with my bestfriends mum who has a nice big budgie aviary, but of course I need to get them nice and healthy first because we don't want to infect her flock.
I am considering keeping the yellow lutino though :) 

joining the cages

Finally with the help of my boyfriend the budgie's cages got joined together, there is a door between each that I can open or close so they can get to each other. At first I was sererating them when I wasn't there in case they fought. But they have been really good and now im just leaving the door open, they st in different sides of their cages or the same if they wan't... so far there hasn't been too much fighting over toys, i notices sometimes its like they are playing follow the leader :) haha


anyway hopefully i will get some pictures soon to share :)

cage mates??

Kirby and Charlie have been so noisy yesterday and today. Decided maybe they were sick of not being able to get to each other, so got Kirby and put her in Charlie's cage to see if they would fight or not. Usually they only last 5 minutes or so before they start attacking each other. 
today they are actually being pretty good, maybe because I have been letting them out together lately. they are both running around, looks like they are playing chasey or something hehe. 
so gonna leave them for a few hours and see if they calm down and act normal lol then I might consider joining their cages together so they will have lots of room and be able to play with each other. 

play time

Charlie had some more fun out of his cage today, was only a short play today though. He was finally comfortable enough to get onto the play gym! although he didn't stay for long. I was hoping he might have a little fly but he seemed to want to just kiss kirby through the cage bars XD can't wait till kirby's flight feathers are all grown back!


anyway I didn't get many pictures but I did get a video :D
just posted it on youtube so check it out if you want!


http://www.youtube.com/user/sezzaxxx92?feature=mhee

moult time

Both Kirby and Charlie have pin feathers at the moment. (pin feathers are new feathers coming through) so I'm hoping Kirby will be growing some new wing feathers.

Pin feathers are incredibly itchy for poor little budgies, so they will rub their heads on their toys and preen each other to help the new feather come out.

Baths also help & my two little babies have been having lots of those lately due to the warmer days as well.

anyway here's a picture of Kirby's pin feathers on her head!

Charlie is being much more confident now, unfortunately he is also biting me more maybe because he isn't afraid, he can see Kirby bitting me, but the only problem is that his bites hurt while Kirby's don't.

he is responding really well to target training, and I know he knows what i want him to do, but often he will choose not to if he thinks its too scary, like if I move the stick to somewhere he doesn't want to go.

apparantly to stop biting its a good idea to move your hand while they are perched on you, so your birds lose balance (which they don't like) and therefor wont bite you because they don't want to lose balance. I tried this, my birds just hand on tighter... i can tip my hand upside down & they will hang on hahaha.

oh well I will keep trying!

see those little pin feathers on the top of her head??
Poor little charlie has them everywhere, his head, his cheeks even his neck!

charlie progress

Yesterday had my friend come visit me, so we played with Kirby and Charlie. Working on getting charlie to feel safe with different people. Had him out and he happily ran around on the top of the cage giving kirby kisses through the bars. (still not letting Kirby out because when she flies she can't turn properly and flies into walls) so he was really good and being calm.
But my sister came barging into my room, and I was telling her to shut the door because charlie was out and he nearly got spooked but luckily shut the door in time and he stayed on the cage phew!
I'm going to have to make a sign to but on my bedroom door saying "budgies out!! DON'T OPEN THE DOOR" hahaha.


Anyway think I will rearrange the cages tomorrow! but Kirby's old mirror toy with perch in her cage yesterday and she has been sitting on it heaps.. think it will always be her favourite toy! 

bring a new budgie home & starting taming!

So I thought I would make a post about how I tamed my budgies and what steps I took when I brought them home to help them trust me and begin taming!


If you have read some of my other post you may know I have two budgies and they were bought at different times.
We will start with my first budgie Kirby.


Kirby was bought from a pet store, at the time I was doing work placement (volunteer work) there for my tafe course. I spotted Kirby and she seemed to be being picked on by the other budgies and I decided I wanted to take her home. She was a real character in the pet store... 
when I brought her home she was in a little budgie size white box, I placed it inside her cage and let her come out in her own time.


don't be worried if they sit still for hours and not eat or drink, this is completely normal they are just afraid of the new place they are in and now its your job to show them that they are safe and you are not going to hurt them.


For the first few days I wouldn't put your hand in the cage. other than to change water & food.
What you should do is sit by the cage, talk to your budgie, whistle to him or her and slowly he should get used to you. Also make sure the cage is in an area of your house that you are in a lot. For me Kirby's cage was in my bedroom because that is where I spend all my time.


In a few days your budgie should be feeling a bit more comfortable, its time to take the next step.


Slowly open the door of your budgies cage, and place your hand inside. Don't try and touch your budgie just leave your hand there, at first it may be afraid but if you keep your hand still it will soon realise your not coming too close and won't be too scared.
the trick is not to force your budgie to like you but to get him to be interested in you and want to like you.
For the next few days you should keep doing this but slowly start moving your hand closer but not touching your budgie.
Some budgies will decide to bite your hand or try out standing on it themselves, if they do this let them. A bird will bite your finger/hand before it wants to step onto you to see if its able to perch on you its not trying to hurt you, Pulling your hand away from your budgie when it bites is a mistake! (because he/she will believe you will go away if he/she bites)  I your budgie is biting you and you think he or she is afraid slowly move your hand away (don't jerk it away) and go back to just leaving your hand there. 


When you feel that your budgie is used to your hand being in the cage trying getting them to "step up".
There are two different ways to do this
The first one is place your finger above the feet, near the abdomen and push gently against your budgie and he may step onto your finger (usually only staying there for 2 seconds). Some budgies will just fly away from you, they are too afraid. you can keep slowly trying to do this method and when your budgie does step up say "good boy/girl" and if they want to get down let them and try again latter. don't force your budgie to get on your finger repeatedly they will get annoyed.
If you can't get your budgie to do this try using the second step:
Most budgies Love millet, try holding some in your hand, offer some to your budgie and get him to eat some while its in your hand. When he is used to eating millet from your hand rearrange the millet so he can't reach it unless he steps on your finger. This is  the method I used with Charlie as he was very scared of me but very food orientated.




Once you are able to get them on your finger, each time you do it they should stay longer and be more comortable. Once Kirby knew how to get on my finger and once she realised it was fun, as soon as my hand went in the cage she would jump on me, I didn't even have to try... even if I was trying to put a new toy on she would be standing on my arm while I was attaching the new toy haha.


Because Kirby was by herself she became tame very quickly as she only had me as a friend.
If you are trying to tame two budgies I would have them in seperate cages while taming.
Charlie was harder to tame than Kirby, I started the taming process when he was in quarantine. And got as far as getting him to step up for a short period usually using millet.
Once he moved into my bedroom where Kirby was, but still a seperate cage, he became much more comfortable, having another budgie around really made him happy and he starting chirping and soon started playing with his toys that he hadn't touched at all before.
I kept using millet to get charlie to step up then slowly stopped using it.
Charlie isn't like Kirby and doesn't want to communicate with humans as much.
But he is slowly learning now, he will step up and let me carry him out of the cage. I am also starting to train him using positive reinforcement. And with time I'm hoping he will be more trusting and less afraid of things.
If you have a very timid budgie like Charlie, or a budgie who is afraid of new things including toys. Just keep trying slowly, eventually you will gain their trust, use millet and positive reinforcement to make them see the things they are afraid of are actually a good thing.

bath time

Charlie has become lots more confident, after a training sesion yesterday he seemed pretty hot so in went the baths for Charlie and Kirby. Usually Charlie doesn't go anywhere near it, or will only stick his beak in unlike Kirby who jumps right in, but this time in he went!! he splashed around and had a great time :)

toys toys toys

Toys are a really important part of having pet birds. Birds are really smart and need toys for their mental and physical health! 
So when you own a bird its up to you to find toys that you can afford and your birds like. These are the one I think my birds love and are a necessary for your cage!


Perches: these may not exactly be a toy but in some ways they can be. when it comes to perches you should have lots of different kinds to exercise your birds feet and so they don't become sore because of having one size/type of perch. 
The different kind of perches I have in my cages are:
Wooden perch: just the normal kind that usually comes in cages! these aren't the best kind of perch but much better than plastic and having one or two along with your other perches won't harm your budgies feet.
mineral/calcium perch: These perches aren't only good for your birds feet but also for their beak and nails! so having one of these in your cage is great for your birds and also they love to chew and rub their beak on them.
rope perch: A rope perch is nice and soft on your birds feet and also exercises them from the different shapes they can be! Most birds will love having a rest on a rope perch! they are also great to be able to bend around the cage.
Natural perch: this you can get from your garden (as long as it hasn't been treated with anything and is safe for your birds) or you can buy one from the pet store. Natural perches are rougher and good for you birds to exercise their feet on. They also like chewing these and many budgies enjoy chewing on branches!
Ladders: ladders can be a perch and a toy! many come with beads attached for you bird to play with, ladder are great for your birds to climb on and are also handy if you have a bird with clipped wings that needs help getting to higher places!


Moving on to toys!


the simple stuff:
Plastic toys: The first toys my budgies ever played with were plastic, and not even bird toys :p
you can buy cheap cat toys easily that your bird will love to play with, like little balls with bells inside! my budgies will never get tired of throwing these around the cage :)
you can get cheap plastic swings with beads attached to the top or bells.
Bells are loved by most birds and anything with a bell on it your bird will probably want to play with! just make sure the bell is safe before giving it to your bird to play with.






wooden blocks: great for chewing on, helping keep that beak healthy! 
Shredable toys: those toys your birds can pull apart and wreck are great for mental stimulation!
preening toys: if your bird doesn't have a friend or even if it does, birds will love a stringy toy they can preen!


play gym: play gyms are great if you let your birds out of the cage, you can hang toys of them and its somewhere they can perch and relax when they are out of the cage here's what mine currently looks like: 

I joined the old little play gym I had together with my new bigger play gym by using this natural perch I got from the pet store, all I did was screw another hook on the end from an old ladder and hook each end to the rope perch.

DANGERS WITH TOYS!


I've never had my birds harm themselves on toys but here's some things I look for to make sure a toy is safe before giving it to my bird.


rope toys, perches or preening toys which have loose string- if this is too long a budgie or small bird can get it wrapped around their neck or feet and panic and harm themselves. If you buy a toy and think the string is too long just cut it shorter, I have done this with many toys!


Bells: many bird toys come with bells that aren't really safe, either the bell has small parts that can come of and the bird can swallow, or its made out of something toxic to your bird.
I've bought sever toys with bells on them that are cooper, including recently buying a bird gym. Cooper is known to be toxic to birds. so take of the bells and replace them with stainless steel.




always check toys to see if they are getting too worn, or have parts loose.
when it comes to anything with rope, it can start to get wrecked and bird can catch their toes in lose strings easily.

here are some toys and perches my budgies love: